WonderCon 2014: Star Wars Rebels

Premiering This Fall On The Disney Channel...

Making an early preview at this year's WonderCon was Lucasfilm's upcoming animated series Star Wars Rebels. Executive Producer Dave Filoni, fresh off the heels of Clone Wars and in the midst of production led the discussion with art director Kilian Plunkett and voice actress Vanessa Marshall who plays the character of Hera. Dave Collins moderated the panel.

The light-hearted panel showed off conceptual art old and new, using early Ralph McQuarrie art as a jumping point to the visual design, bringing the show closer to "Star Wars" than ever before. Dave Filoni talked about Miyazaki's Princess Mononoke as an inspiration and also mentioned Disney's Tangled, as one of the more beautiful 3D films that had a very 2D sensibility. When asked about about the new ownership of Disney, Filoni said that having worked for Disney in the past, it was very much the same but with access to many more talented artists.

Also revealed is that Kevin Kiner, composer on Clone Wars would indeed return for music duties on Rebels. Kiner even made an appearance on stage to talk about his inspiration for it, that it's some John Williams and some of his own. The opening score was played for the audience, giving a taste of themes from the original Star Wars as well as some cues from Return of the Jedi.

For actress Vanessa Marshall, already a huge Star Wars fan, she talked about how thrilled she was to be a part of the project. Filoni added that it was important for them to make good female roles that took charge of the action rather than to sit on the sidelines. A new clip of Hera was shown.

Star Wars Rebels will premiere this fall on The Disney Channel with the series then continuing on Disney XD.